Byron Dorgan

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. My understanding is the Senator from Wisconsin is going to speak for about 5 minutes. I ask consent to be recognized following his presentation.

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I was inspired by my colleague from South Carolina. Senator Hollings comes to the floor to speak, among other things, about international trade issues and does it in a way that is not only right on point but also very colorful. I would like to follow on that a bit and talk about a couple of other subjects. I know we have the class action reform bill on the floor of the Senate, but that bill apparently is going nowhere at this moment. My understanding is the majority leader has ``filled the tree,'' which is a fancy way of saying he is blocking everything. He puts a bill down, blocks everything, and creates a little gate in the majority leader's office saying: Show me your amendment. If I like it, you can offer it; if I don't, you can't. That is where we are. Because of that action, I assume very little is going to happen at the moment. While I think that class action reform is an important issue and we should get to the amendments to the bill, there are other things we also need to be doing. There is a lot of unfinished business in this Chamber. We are doing very little on any of it, regrettably. On appropriations, we had some subcommittee markups scheduled this week that have been canceled. We need to get the appropriations done. Writing a new highway bill, we were supposed to have written the highway bill last year, and it is not done this year. Now they are talking about extending it until next year. There is no better job generator for those who are concerned about new jobs in this country than having a highway bill because that puts people to work right now with contractors and workers all across this country. Yet the highway bill was supposed to have been rewritten last year. It wasn't. It was supposed to have been rewritten this year. It isn't. So there is a lot to do in this Congress that is regrettably not getting done. There is a lot of unfinished business. My colleague from South Carolina talked about trade, the trade deficit, the shrinking employment base in manufacturing and the shrinking manufacturing base itself in this country. He also spoke of the Chamber of Commerce that was critical of our colleague, Senator Edwards. That was one of the things I was going to talk about today. The head of the Chamber of Commerce, in a speech just within recent days, said people who are affected by off-shoring should ``stop whining.'' Again, the head of the Chamber of Commerce says those people who are affected by outsourcing, by the movement of jobs overseas, by offshoring, ought to ``stop whining.'' I don't know of the head of a corporation who has had his or her job moved overseas. I don't know of a Member of the House or Senate, I don't know of a politician who has had his or her job moved overseas. I don't know of one journalist who has had his or her job moved overseas. But there are plenty of folks who work in manufacturing in this country who have been the victims of offshoring, outsourcing, moving jobs overseas. I have pointed this out on numerous occasions, but it is worthwhile to do it again, just because it is, I think, such a good illustration of what is happening in our economy. This is a bicycle I have spoken of often in the Senate, a Huffy bicycle. Most Americans know of a Huffy bicycle. It has 20 percent of the American market. Many Americans have ridden a Huffy bicycle. This used to be made in Ohio, by the way, by one plant with over 900 proud employees who made Huffy bicycles and did a good job by all accounts. They came to work one day and discovered they were all fired. Why were they fired? Because they made $11 an hour plus benefits and that was too costly. The manufacturing plant in which these bicycles were produced was moved to China. It was moved to China because they could hire somebody for 33 cents an hour in China and work them 12 or 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. So that is why Huffy bicycles are not made in this country any longer. Those who say to those 900-plus workers who lost their jobs, ``stop whining,'' apparently don't understand the anguish of being told, in this country, that making $11 an hour is too much money. You can't compete with a Chinese worker who makes 33 cents an hour. The American people don't need to be told that. We can't compete with 33 cents an hour. We can't compete with someone in Indonesia who is making shoes for 16 cents an hour. We understand we can't compete with that. Nor should we be required to. This country, for one century, has fought over the issues that are important to a good life in this country, issues of abolishing child labor, in which we were sending kids into factories and down into mines. So we have child labor laws. There are issues about plants that dump effluents and poisons into the air and water, and so we have environmental laws. We have issues about safe workplaces, so that workers can expect to go into a factory that is safe, and so we have laws dealing with safe workplaces. There are issues about fair wages, so we have minimum wages in this country. There are issues about the right to organize. People died on the streets in this country for the right to organize as workers, and so we have labor unions with the right for people to organize. In one fell swoop, a company wishing to pole-vault over all of those issues can simply decide it wants to be an American company for purposes of incorporation, but it would like to be a foreign company for purposes of production. Whether it is a Huffy bicycle or a little red wagon, the Radio Flier wagon which for 100 years was made in this country and now is gone, they can decide to move the production of those products somewhere in the world where they don't have to worry about child labor laws, environmental laws, about a labor union, because they can move it to a place where labor unions are not permitted, workers are not permitted to organize, where there are no requirements with respect to fair wages. What is happening, as we know, is more and more companies are engaged in outsourcing. It is not just bicycles and little red wagons, the Radio Fliers; it is not just that. It is now white collar jobs as well, where there is outsourcing into Indonesia and China and elsewhere. And they are told stop whining. By whom? By people who have never lost their jobs and are not about to. They are not going to lose their jobs to outsourcing. To them, this is all theory. By describing all of this, I am not suggesting we build a wall around this country because I don't believe we should or could. I believe in expanded trade and I believe in expanding opportunities for Americans through trade. But I do not believe in the kind of trade agreements that have been brought to this Senate for approval. I don't intend to support the Australian-United States Free Trade Agreement, which will come to the floor of the Senate soon, because it, again, in my judgment, undercuts the interests of this country. I am perfectly willing to support trade agreements that are fair to this country, fair to America's workers and require us to engage in competitive and fair trade. If we can't win in fair trade, then that is our tough luck. That is our fault. But let me give some examples of what our trade negotiators have done, time after time after time. If there are people who want to defend this, I wish they would come to the floor of the Senate. None have and none will. I will give just one example and then go on to several others. About 2 years ago, we did a bilateral trade agreement with the country of China. In that agreement our trade negotiators said this to China: You produce automobiles and ship them to the United States. We will charge a tariff of 2.5 percent on any automobiles that you ship into the United States. But we agree that any U.S. automobiles, any automobiles produced in the U.S. that we would ship to China, you can charge a 25-percent tariff. In other words, our negotiators said: I will tell you what we will do. You have a very large trade surplus with us, China. We have a $130 billion trade deficit with you. But I will tell you what we will do. We will set up an agreement with respect to automobile trade, and you can charge a tariff on U.S. automobiles going to China that is 10 times higher than any tariff we would impose on Chinese automobiles going to the U.S. I would like to find the softheaded negotiator who decided that this is something that is fair to America, fair to America's workers or fair to America's producers. I don't come from an automobile State. I will give you one more example of automobile trade--that is, automobile trade with Korea. We have a circumstance with Korea where we ship about 2,800 automobiles every year to be sold in Korea. That is how many automobiles we get into Korea. What does Korea ship to the United States? Somewhere over six hundred thousand vehicles come into our marketplace, and 2,800 we get into Korea. You know why? Because our marketplace is wide open and the Korean Government doesn't want U.S. cars in Korea, so they set up dozens of impediments to our shipment of U.S. cars to the Korean marketplace. The list goes on and on and on. If you are an American rancher and believe you ought to get beef into Japan--after all, we have a deficit with Japan of $50 billion to $60 billion every year, year after year, so the Japanese market ought to be open to U.S. beef--you find that years after the United States-Japan beef agreement, there still remains a 50-percent tariff on every single pound of beef that is sent from this country into Japan. Unfair? You bet your life it is. Anybody care about it? No. Our trade negotiators are off busy negotiating new agreements with Singapore, Australia, Morocco, Honduras, Costa Rica-- all of these new agreements that create new unfairness in trade law-- before they will even talk to you about the old trade laws that aren't working. We have the largest trade deficit in history--not just our history but in the history of the world. Someday it will have to be repaid. It will regrettably be paid with a lower standard of living in this country, and nobody seems to care about it. Let me talk about that trade deficit for a moment. On May 13, we see headlines that the U.S. trade deficit grows unchecked--a $46 billion trade gap in March--1 month, a $46 billion trade deficit. How about the next month, June 15, when we learn that the U.S. trade deficit sets another record in April--$48.3 billion in a single month. Up and up and up goes this trade deficit, with American jobs leaving, outsourcing, offshoring. That is not a way, in my judgment, to strengthen our country and strengthen our economy. No country will long remain a world economic power without a strong, vibrant, growing manufacturing base, and our manufacturing base is being decimated month after month. These are not circumstances of fair trade. We ought to be debating them on the floor of the Senate with respect to legislation. But we will not. Instead, we will debate the United States-Australia Free Trade Agreement, and will be unable to offer a single amendment because of fast track rules. While I talk about some of the circumstances of trade, one of the problems, of course, is that U.S. companies are setting up foreign subsidiaries--not for the purpose of producing in a foreign country for sale in another foreign country, but for the purpose of producing in a foreign country for the sale into the U.S. marketplace. And in fact, another reason they are setting up foreign subsidiaries is to avoid paying taxes to the U.S. Government. Here is an interesting statistic. In a recent year, of the 100 largest publicly traded companies that do business with the Federal Government--I am talking about Federal contractors, the biggest companies that build things, airplanes, tanks and all of the things they sell to the Federal Government--59 of them had created subsidiaries in tax-haven countries. Why? Because they want to move production plants to tax-saving countries? No. Because they don't want to pay taxes. Halliburton Corporation, the subject of a couple of hearings I have had, had 17 subsidiaries, 13 in the Cayman Islands. This is all about running a corporation through a mailbox, not for the purpose of producing anything but for the purpose of trying to avoid paying taxes. What you have is companies that decide they want to be American citizens, they want to do business in this country, they want to sell into our marketplace and contract with the Federal Government, but they do not want to pay taxes. Second, to the extent they can, the production which they want to contract to the Federal government they want to move offshore. Why? Because it is cheaper to produce offshore. Once again, anytime someone gives a speech, as my colleague from South Carolina did or as I do from time to time, about trade and requiring and demanding fair trade rules, the institutional press and others will say this is just uninformed nonsense from a bunch of xenophobic, isolationist stooges who can't see over the horizon. You can't have a thoughtful debate about trade. We have now a $48 billion monthly trade deficit. Nobody wants to talk about it. Nobody will talk about it. Will there be anything brought to the floor of the Senate to deal with this? No. We talk a lot about the fiscal policies and budget deficits, and we have a reckless fiscal policy that is out of control. No question about that. But this trade policy is something nobody talks about, and these trade policy deficits are way out of control. They are affecting our economic base, our manufacturing base, and our productive capacity in this country. We will pay a heavy price for that unless we decide at some point that our trading partners are required to engage with us in fair, competitive, and open trade. My colleague talked a little bit about the effort through the WTO and the allegation by some that we must remove our antidumping provisions that exist in law. Antidumping provisions are provisions that protect a country against another country that would try to dump into that marketplace at a price well below the price of production and injure or demolish an industry in your country. The trade ambassador said those are on the table for negotiation. We are willing to negotiate and we will negotiate in the WTO negotiations our antidumping provisions and get rid of them potentially. So we will get rid of the only protection that exists for producers and workers in this country against unfair competition. I don't understand that. Is there some notion that we shouldn't stand up for this country's interests? I come from a State that must find a foreign home for a substantial amount of its agricultural production, and I am the last person in the world to want a trade war or to shut down opportunities for fair trade. But I will give you some examples of things that bother us. We produce a great deal of wheat in my State. So we do a bilateral trade agreement with China. The Chinese say: Well, under this agreement we will set a tariff rate quota of 8.5 million metric tons. I didn't believe that, but I especially didn't believe it when I saw the South Asia Post one day and the Agriculture Minister from China was traveling down there speaking in an interview in the South Asia Post. He said to the Chinese: This 8.5 million metric tons of wheat, that is just theory. That is just theory. That doesn't mean we are going to buy it. And sure enough, they didn't buy it. Now, finally, they have made some modest purchases. But we didn't have any substantial quantity of wheat going into China for years after the agreement because they didn't have any intention of making those purchases. Our farmers deserve the opportunity to compete in these markets and yet were denied that opportunity. Probably the most obvious hood ornament on foolishness here in Congress in terms of public policy and in the White House is our attempt to sell goods into Cuba. Talk about a political odd couple. John Ashcroft and I, when he was a Senator, actually got legislation passed which is now law, and it opens just a bit the embargo with Cuba so that we could sell agricultural commodities into Cuba. After 40 years of an embargo, we finally, because of the bipartisan work here in the Congress, passed a law that opened that market just a bit so we can sell some agricultural products into Cuba. Cuba has to pay cash. They have to run the transaction through a European bank, a bank that is not in this country. But, nonetheless, we have been selling agricultural products to Cuba. But the State Department and the administration are doing everything they can, every conceivable thing they can to shut down even that small amount of export of agricultural commodities to Cuba. I don't understand this effort to injure ourselves. Public policy that hurts our country, that is believed to be sound and good policy, whether it is at the White House or by some in Congress, is something that makes no sense to me at all. On a related subject but somewhat off of trade, in addition, with respect to Cuba, we have a travel ban. That travel ban, incidentally, is an attempt to slap around Fidel Castro, someone for whom I have no use at all, a Communist dictator that Cuba does not deserve. In an attempt to punish Fidel Castro, our Government has decided we shall prohibit Americans from traveling to Cuba, so we have a travel ban. We do not ban people from traveling to Communist China. We do not ban people from traveling to Communist Vietnam. But they cannot go to Cuba. At a time when we are beset by terrorist threats in this country, we have a little organization down in the U.S. Department of Treasury that ought to hang its head these days. They have, I understand, 20 people in an organization called OFAC, Office of Foreign Assets Control. Their job is to track financial movements of money to the terrorist organizations. Twenty of them are tracking Americans traveling to Cuba. They are accusing them of trying to take a vacation. A woman named Joan Scott went to Cuba. Joan Scott went to Cuba to distribute free Bibles on the streets in Cuba with a missionary zeal and a religious sense of making a difference. She went to Cuba to distribute free Bibles. Guess what. Boy, the Treasury Department got hold of her recently and is going to fine her $10,000. There is a fellow from near Seattle, WA. His dad died and was cremated. His dad's last wish was to be buried on the church grounds where he ministered in Cuba. This young fellow took his dad's ashes to Cuba. They tracked him down, the people who are tracking down terrorists. They tracked down a young man taking his dad's ashes to Cuba. Or Joan Slote. They are supposed to track terrorists; they tracked Joan Slote down. Joan Slote is a 76-year-old grandmother who rides a bicycle all over the world. She joined a Canadian bicycle club and bicycled to Cuba. She did not know it wasn't legal. She had a good time, a 76-year-old grandmother bicycling to Cuba. They tracked her down right quick and slapped a big fine on her. It was all a mistake because she was not even home when they sent her the first letter. She was gone because her son was dying of a brain tumor. She was not there, did not get the letter, so they slapped her with a bigger fine. After she paid part of that fine, they tried to attach part of her Social Security check. These are people who are supposed to be tracking terrorists, but they are going after people distributing free Bibles in Cuba, retired grandmothers who are taking bicycle trips, and a young fellow trying to bury his dead father's ashes. It is embarrassing what is happening in this administration dealing with this issue of the travel ban. We have, on repeated occasions, on a bipartisan basis, with Republican support and Democrat support in the Senate, voted to lift that ban. Yet, somehow, in the end, the White House always wins. That ban is in place and we are using precious resources that are supposed to be tracking terrorists who are now tracking American citizens accused of taking vacations in Cuba and slapping them with $10,000 fines. I digress. That was not the point of raising the Cuba issue. The Cuba issue is about trade and the foolishness of what we are doing to inhibit our family farmers from fully exploring the opportunities of trade in Cuba. We have a natural advantage over Canadian and European farmers with respect to that marketplace. Incidentally, they are required to pay cash for the food they buy in these trades and yet the administration is making it more and more difficult for our farmers to access those marketplaces. I started by saying the Senator from South Carolina was talking about the Chamber of Commerce and, as I said, the President of the Chamber of Commerce said people should stop whining if they are affected by offshoring or offsourcing or moving jobs overseas. I don't think people who have been hurt by this should stop speaking up at all. I don't think they are whining. But you could certainly see the anguish on the faces of people who are proud to go to work in the morning and make a good product, only to discover their employer felt $11 an hour was excessive and they would sooner get that product made by Chinese workers at 33 cents an hour. You can certainly see the anguish in the faces of those people who had to go home some night and tell their loved ones: Honey, I lost my job. It was not my fault. I worked here for 15 years. I lost my job today because I make $11 an hour and my employer wants to go offshore and find somebody who will do it for 33 cents an hour, and who will be prevented from joining a labor union, and who will work at a plant that may not necessarily be safe, and who will work in a plant that will put poisons into the air and the water, and who will work in a plant where there are no child labor laws. That is a hard thing for people to do, to go home and tell their families. It is not whining. These Americans deserve better than that. This country was built by people who take showers after work. This country was built by people who work hard, do their best, expect a fair deal, expect there is some connection between effort and reward in this country. And regrettably, these days, when we see this avalanche of outsourcing and offshoring and decisions that this is not about workers being part of the country, workers are like a pair of pliers or tools; when you are done with them, get rid of them. That attitude on the part of business is wrong. I visited with a CEO of a corporation recently. He said, I am one of the few companies in my industry that has not offshored or outsourced a portion of the servicing of my customers. He said, Everyone else has done it and I have not. It costs me more and it makes me a little less competitive because I have not done it, but I have resisted it because I have not wanted to lay off workers in the United States and to outsource that to China or India. I applaud him. But there are precious few companies which have that attitude. In short, we need trade laws that stand up for this country's interests. Why is it embarrassing for someone to say, I support this country's interests? Why has that become something no one will talk about? I am not talking about advantage; I am talking about fair trade. Why is it not fair for us to say we stand for requirements of compensation that are fair? Yes, with China, with Japan, with Korea, with Europe. Why do we allow Korea to have a 300-percent tariff on potato flakes from our country? Why do we allow the Koreans to decide they will keep out our American automobiles to the extent they can, or keep out American pickup trucks to the extent they can, while boats pull up at our docks with Korean cars? I say to Korea, that is fine, bring your cars to our marketplace. Our consumers want the opportunity to shop for them. But there is a condition for that. Then your market must be open to American vehicles. It must. We ought to have the strength and the assertiveness to say that to all of our trading partners. This country needs to get a backbone. This country needs to have a spine that says, look, we believe in trade and it should be mutually beneficial. We also are not going to apologize for standing up for this country's interests. This country has interest in a growing economy and expanding economy and jobs. There is no essential program we will vote on in this Congress that is as important as a good job that pays well with good benefits. There is no social program that is any more important than that. It is time, it seems to me, to turn to important things in the Senate. First and foremost, perhaps the majority leader should come to the Senate and stop blocking amendments so we can finish the class action bill. If we do not finish the class action bill, it will be because of one reason, and that is because the majority leader decided to block amendments. If he wanted to offer amendments, I assume our side could have offered a number of the amendments we were prepared to offer today, work through tonight, tomorrow, tomorrow night, and finish the class action bill. In my judgment, in all the discussions I have been in, and I am part of the leadership on our side, there was no desire to block class action. There was an acknowledgment and an understanding that this bill was going to get done--until this morning when the majority leader came to the Senate and used an unprecedented maneuver to block all amendments except those with which he would agree. The first thing we ought to do is unhinge that problem, move forward on class action, and then deal with a range of other issues we know are important for this Congress. It is surprising to me how little this Congress has accomplished and how much it should be required to accomplish. The highway bill, which is so important, as I indicated earlier, is last year's business. It was not done last year and now apparently will not be done this year. What are we doing? Standing around here in the Senate. We will not vote today, apparently, and probably will not vote tomorrow, I don't know why. Why? Because we have these unusual procedures of blocking amendments because someone is concerned, apparently, that someone else is going to offer an amendment that somebody else does not like. I do not understand. We probably should be required to retreat someplace in a room and read Senator Byrd's history of the U.S. Senate. Maybe that would be helpful, and we can read about some of the great debates in this Congress--tough debates, sharp debates. But they went on and they had votes and they resolved them and got through them. Mr. President, with that, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleague, Senator Conrad, in introducing legislation that provides much needed relief to farmers and ranchers who have been devastated by weather conditions. Farmers and ranchers from my state began the year with great optimism. Producers were eager to get their crop in the ground so they could get a good return on their investments and their hard work. But, harsh weather conditions have plagued our state. In some regions of North Dakota, late snow followed by unusually high rainfall left much of our fields under water and unfit to plant. Preliminary reports estimate that as much as two million acres of crops were unable to be planted or had crops that were destroyed after planting. This has placed the livelihood of many North Dakota producers in serious jeopardy. In the southwest portion of the state, the drought conditions have crippled livestock producers. Southwest North Dakota is terribly dry and has been for nearly two years. They have received almost no rain, making haying and grazing land very hard to come by, and causing feed expenses to soar. These family farmers and ranchers ought not have to bear this burden alone. I am very pleased to join Senator Conrad in introducing disaster legislation to help ease the financial burden of producers in their time of need. We need quick action on this legislation because producers need help, and they need it now. The legislation being introduced today is very straightforward and almost identical to disaster legislation enacted in previous years, including last year. Farmers experiencing crop loss of higher than 35 percent would be eligible for disaster assistance. Folks who bought crop insurance would be eligible for payments equal to 50 percent of the crop price, and those who did not purchase insurance would be eligible for payments equal to 40 percent of the crop price. Under this legislation, the uninsured producers will be required to purchase crop insurance for the following two years in order to receive any disaster assistance. Also, ranchers suffering grazing losses will be eligible for assistance to help pay for the cost of feed. To be eligible, they must have suffered 40 percent loss during three consecutive months. The weather conditions, beyond human control, have placed the livelihood of our farmers and ranchers at risk and I urge Congress to act quickly.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I want to mention in the context of the discussion which has been held between the Senator from Virginia and the Senator from Nevada that I believe the second-degree amendment which I had intended to offer to Senator Brownback's second-degree amendment will be in order. I have been working throughout the weekend. The question with the Parliamentarian was whether it would be relevant. I believe we have now revised that amendment so it will be relevant. My understanding is Senator Brownback has offered an amendment on indecency to this Defense authorization bill which came out of the Commerce Committee with respect to broadcasting. Senator Burns of Montana offered a second degree to Senator Brownback's amendment. I would not offer an amendment that would be extraneous to the Defense authorization bill except that the amendment Senator Brownback offered came out of Commerce Committee on a matter that addressed a related issue--that is, the concentration of broadcast ownership--which I, Senator Lott, Senator Snowe, and others added in the Commerce Committee. Senator Brownback offered an amendment on the floor of the Senate excluding that provision. I understand why. I am not being critical of him at all. But I would want to add that back using a second-degree slot as soon as we can find a way in which Senator Burns' second-degree slot will be resolved. I say to the Senator from Virginia: I am here and ready any time to offer that amendment. It would not be my intention to hold up the Defense authorization bill. In fact, I wouldn't be offering this amendment were it not for the fact that Senator Brownback's amendment on indecency was offered to the Defense bill when it came out of the Commerce Committee containing the amendment on broadcast ownership which I had previously offered with Senator Lott. I wanted to make the Senator from Virginia aware that the second degree I will offer, along with Senator Snowe and some others, is certainly available, and I would want to find an opportunity to offer that amendment.

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, in response, my amendment would be a second-degree amendment offered to Senator Brownback, but that second- degree slot, I believe at this moment, is filled by an amendment previously offered by Senator Burns. I don't quite know how to resolve that, but at some point Senator Burns' second-degree amendment will be resolved, that second-degree slot will be open, and I will offer an amendment similar to that which we did in the Commerce Committee.

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, let me take a moment to consult with some staff on our side with respect to the parliamentary situation. Let me say again, so the Senator from Virginia is clear, and I think he is, this Defense authorization bill needs to get completed with some dispatch. I sympathize with the challenge he and the Senator from Michigan have had trying to move it along. It is not my intent in any way to delay that. I feel obligated, as I think do others in the Senate, that when Senator Brownback offered an extraneous amendment, that amendment which previously included broadcast ownership limitation issues dealing with the FCC rules, to add that back to the indecency language. I will consult with our side in a moment and perhaps I can make some comments about it, and if others wish to make comments, we would find a way to vote as soon as the Burns second-degree amendment is disposed of. Let me do some consultation and perhaps I can speak.

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, let me say again this amendment is not related to the subject of the Defense authorization. The only reason I offer it is because the amendment offered by Senator Brownback, which itself is not related to Defense authorization, was offered last Friday. I indicated when he offered that amendment, which I support, that I would second-degree it, because we second-degreed it in the Commerce Committee, and we merged two issues: indecency and the issue of broadcast ownership rules and regulations. When my colleague from Kansas offers an indecency amendment to the Defense authorization bill, I don't have much choice except to offer the amendment we offered to it in the Commerce Committee. If this bill is stripped of all extraneous amendments, I will understand that and I will not complain. But if this bill is going to proceed with amendments of the type that came from the Commerce Committee, then I insist it also include the issue of broadcast ownership rules and regulations that were adopted by the Federal Communications Commission. Let me describe what all this is about with respect to broadcast ownership. The Federal Communications Commission did a rulemaking on the issue of broadcast ownership. They had somewhere around three- quarters of a million Americans, unprecedented numbers of Americans, write and e-mail and send concerns and expressions of their interest to the Federal Communications Commission. Almost all of them said to the FCC: Don't change the rules and regulations with respect to broadcast ownership of properties in a way that injures the public interest. It didn't matter to the FCC. They went ahead and changed the rules. The way the FCC constructed it, the rules say: It is all right if in your community--let's say you live in one of the biggest cities in America--one company owns three television stations, eight radio stations, the cable company, and the dominant newspaper. That is fine. Well, it is not fine with me--it is not fine with, by far, the majority of the American people--to see fewer and fewer Americans, no more than a handful, who are going to have control over what the rest of the American people see, hear, and read. Let me say again what the FCC allowed. In the biggest cities of the country, one company can come in and buy up eight radio stations, three television stations, the cable company, and the dominant newspaper--in many cases, the only newspaper. Why is this of concern? Well, it is of concern to me because we license the use of the airwaves. They don't belong to broadcasters or radio stations or television stations. They belong to the people. The airwaves belong to the American people. We license their use to certain companies in exchange for certain obligations. One of those obligations that has never and will never be old fashioned is localism. That is not an old-fashioned requirement for broadcasters. So the question is, how do you develop or how do you maintain or how do you have localism in broadcast properties when one company owns, in this case, 1,200 radio stations. Yes, that is the case. One company owns 1,200 radio stations. We did hearings about all these subjects. Let me tell you about something called voice tracking. This is antithetical to localism. Voice tracking is a process by which a company that owns a lot of radio stations will have someone in a basement in Baltimore, MD broadcasting. And he is broadcasting over, for example, a station in Salt Lake City, UT, saying: It is a beautiful morning here in Salt Lake City. The sun is shining over the mountains. What a great day to wake up in our city. The problem is, that guy was broadcasting from Baltimore. He was using the Internet to find out that the sun is shining in Salt Lake City. It is called voice tracking. It is fooling the consumers into believing that announcer is there. It has nothing to do with localism or responsibilities of localism. There is another approach used by television stations. It is called central casting. It is trying to make you believe the news team is from your city when, in fact, it is not. Central casting, voice tracking, these are mechanisms by which the large concentrations of broadcasters are trying to convince people there is localism to their broadcasts. Some of us believe very strongly that this is moving in the wrong direction. I am not opposed to big because something is big. Good for the folks who are successful. If somebody has two radio stations and buys two more, good for them. If they have eight and buy eight more, good for them. If they have 50 and buy 50 more, I am not going to come here and complain about that. But 1,200 radio stations in the hands of one company? Or television broadcasting stations being gobbled up together under one big ownership group? Is that good for our country, especially in an area where, in most cases, you have monopolies or near monopolies and now this FCC rule says, in addition to all of that, with respect to broadcasting properties, we are going to get rid of that pernicious rule that allows cross ownership of broadcast properties with the newspaper? At the hearing in the Commerce Committee, I held up a letter that was sent out all across the country by an investment banking company. They said: Get ready, because the FCC is fixing to change its rule, and when they do, your newspapers can buy up a bunch of broadcast properties. And so they are already. The FCC rule, fortunately for us, has not yet gone into effect because it was stayed by a Federal court. This issue is now in the Federal court. So there is a stay order. It may well be lifted soon when the Federal court makes its judgment. But that begs for the Congress to make its own judgment to overturn and rescind the FCC rules. Senator Lott, Senator Snowe, myself, and others brought this issue to the Senate floor with something called a veto of an administrative rule. It is called the Congressional Accountability Act in which we have the opportunity to veto a rule by a Federal Agency. It has only been used once. We offered that. And by a very significant margin, we won. So the expression of the Senate already has been to say: We don't support the FCC rule. We believe it should be rescinded. And using the Congressional Accountability Act, the Senate, on a bipartisan vote, said: We don't want these rules to go into effect, FCC, start over and do it right. Well, that Senate vote went to the House of Representatives and it is now sitting at the desk in the House of Representatives 10 votes short. They need 218 votes. They have a letter with 208 signatures on it and they are 10 short and they cannot move. The Speaker of the House and the administration very much oppose this. They have stymied it in the House of Representatives. My feeling is that the only opportunity we have in a circumstance such as this is to offer an amendment on a bill, such as the Brownback bill--and, incidentally, we are faithful to our determination to move this. We offered the same amendment in the Commerce Committee when Senator Brownback brought up his legislation. We prevailed there. I support the Brownback legislation and the second-degree amendment that Senator Burns intends to offer to it as well. I hope the Senate will, once again, support my second-degree amendment once the amendment by Senator Burns is disposed of. We had testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee, and I don't remember the fellow's name. He testified two or three times. He owns a pretty big broadcasting company in one of the States south of here. He explained the problem with the growth and concentration in broadcasting. He said: I own a good television station, but I cannot tell the folks from Hollywood or New York what I want to show in my viewing area because if they are sending out a program I think is something I don't want to show, I don't have the opportunity to say we will not show that. I will lose my network affiliate status if I do that. I don't have the capability to make any kind of local decision about this. Look, I happen to think broadcasting, whether it is radio or television, has some of the most breathtaking, wonderful, remarkable programming; some of it is extraordinary. I also think there are programs that are shabby, trashy, and disgusting. You have both sides of it. I don't know, maybe somebody adds to their cultural interests by tuning in on HDTV and seeing someone eating maggots from a bowl in a contest. I don't know. I would expect that very few find much interest in that. I guess it does achieve some ratings from time to time. But when you have concentrations of broadcast properties, as has been the case, dramatic increases in just the hands of a few people deciding what the rest of the American people are going to see, read, and hear, I think it ought to be of great concern to the Congress. The FCC rule caved in almost instantly to the big economic interests here. I know those who own newspapers are upset with the position I take. Those who own broadcast properties are upset with the position I take. But the fact is, this is about the public interest, and the public interest is best served when we decide localism is not old-fashioned. I don't object to some big companies. But I object to circumstances when the big companies are given the green light by the FCC to own almost everything in a community with respect to communications--radio station, television stations, the cable company. Whatever happened to the market system? The market system is where you have robust competition, broad-based economic ownership. I don't see much of that market system in broadcasting these days. All you see are the gobbling up by big interests. It is interesting, we now have a 35-percent ownership cap on national viewing by the major television networks, in terms of the number of stations they can own, which has now, as a result of last year's omnibus bill, gone to 39 percent. It used to be 25 percent. In fact, in 1996, when we had a bill on the floor called the Telecommunications Act, we had a prohibition on owning television stations beyond 25 percent of the national audience. That new bill took 35 percent. I came to the Senate floor in 1996 and offered an amendment to take it back to 25 percent--the national ownership cap--with respect to one company. It is interesting, we debated that about 4 o'clock in the afternoon and then we had a vote. It turns out I won the vote. Senator Dole, with a pretty substantial opposition on the floor of the Senate when he wanted to be, was on the other side. So we had a vote on broadcast ownership limitation and I won, I think by three or four votes. I thought that was extraordinary, to win a vote like that. Then I believe Senator D'Amato, as the vote was coming to an end, changed his vote to be on my side, the prevailing side. I knew something was wrong, but I didn't know what until 4 hours later. What had intervened 4 hours later was dinner. Apparently, there was some epiphany over dinner for four or five Senators, who came back, and there was a motion to reconsider; these Senators who had had some glorious meal, which apparently infused them with a different wisdom, changed their vote and it turned out I had won only for 4 hours. That happens around here. You can win big and long but sometimes not permanently. That was the case in 1996. I express that to say this is not a new issue with me. I have been concerned about this concentration of broadcast ownership for a long while. What the FCC has done is compounded the problem. Not only are we saying ``Katey bar the door,'' whatever you want to buy, buy it, but we will add to the mix the newspapers. While you are buying each other up and playing these monopoly games, throw in the newspapers as well. We don't care very much. That is the message from the FCC. Fortunately, the Senate has sent a different message. We already voted on this subject and expressed our interest that the rules crafted by the Federal Communications Commission are completely out of sync with reality and ought to be rescinded. That was a big vote in the Senate. There was no reconsideration. We had to come back and lose that one. Senator Lott and myself and others spoke in support of overturning those rules. That is stuck in the House because the Speaker will not allow a vote on it. We are going to have to find a way, in whatever expression we can, to advance this issue. Because Senator Brownback brought to the floor a bill that used to include this amendment when it came out of the Commerce Committee, but is not what he offered on the floor, I am required to offer this amendment to the Brownback amendment. I will offer it in the second degree. My understanding is, while there is already a second-degree in the form of Senator Burns' amendment, when I offer this at the end of my presentation, the second-degree I will offer will be able to be disposed of when the amendment of Senator Burns is disposed. I support the Brownback amendment and the Burns amendment. If anybody can understand all that, they are perhaps better than I am. I say to the Senator from Virginia, I would like us to finish this Defense authorization bill and deal with these issues. I encourage the Senator to accept all three of these amendments and take them to conference. If I might get the attention of the Senator from Nevada, Senator Reid, I think we will need a unanimous consent request prior to my formally offering a second-degree amendment, since there is already a second-degree amendment in the slot. But having already spoken on this, I don't need to speak further. Perhaps Senators Snowe, or Lott, or others wish to speak in favor of the amendment. I will rely on the Senator from Virginia and the Senator from Nevada to offer my amendment at the appropriate time when the consent is agreed to, and then mine would be disposed of following Senator Burns' second-degree amendment.

Mr. DORGAN. There are some interests, of course, outside of the Chamber that would not want this amendment to the Brownback bill. I want to make sure we have an understanding that I get the opportunity to do this. Otherwise, I have a much longer statement that I would be prepared to make. My preference would be to leave it at this and to simply get this pending as soon as possible.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, perhaps I do not understand all I should, and I certainly do not understand the term ``modernization of nuclear weapons.'' We have thousands of nuclear weapons in this world. We control thousands of them in this country. Modernization? It appears now in this debate to be a euphemism for building new nuclear weapons, designer nuclear weapons, usable nuclear weapons, the kinds of weapons you might use, for example, to bust into caves, the ground, bunker busters. That is the purpose of this amendment, to stop this march toward production of more nuclear weapons. This country ought to be leading in exactly the other direction. Let me read from Time magazine in March of 2002. For a few harrowing weeks last fall, a group of U.S. officials believed that the worst nightmare of their lives-- something even more horrific than 9/11--was about to come true. In October an intelligence alert went out to a small number of government agencies, including the Energy Department's top-secret Nuclear Emergency Search Team, based in Nevada. The report said that terrorists were thought to have obtained a 10-kiloton nuclear weapon from the Russian arsenal and planned to smuggle it into New York City. The source of the report was a mercurial agent code-named DRAGONFIRE, who intelligence officials believed was of ``undetermined'' reliability. But DRAGONFIRE's claim tracked with a report from a Russian general who believed his forces were missing a 10-kiloton device. Since the mid-'90s, proliferation experts have suspected that several portable nuclear devices might be missing from the Russian stockpile. That made the DRAGONFIRE report alarming. So did this: detonated in lower Manhattan, a 10-kiloton bomb would kill some 100,000 civilians and irradiate 700,000 more, flattening everything in a half-mile diameter. And so counterterrorist investigators went on their highest state of alert. ``It was brutal,'' a U.S. official told TIME. It was also highly classified and closely guarded. Under the aegis of the White House's Counterterrorism Security Group, part of the National Security Council, the suspected nuke was kept secret so as not to panic the people of New York. Senior FBI officials were not in the loop. Former mayor Rudolph Giuliani says he was never told about the threat. In the end, the investigators found nothing and concluded that DRAGONFIRE's information was false. But few of them slept better. They had made a chilling realization: if terrorists did manage to smuggle a nuclear weapon into the city, there was almost nothing anyone could do about it. Our experts thought, based on some evidence from some folks in the intelligence community, that one nuclear weapon was missing from the Russian arsenal and might be detonated in the middle of an American city. Now, there are tens of thousands of nuclear weapons in the world. We think, probably, between 25,000 and 30,000 nuclear weapons. One missing would be devastating. One of them acquired by terrorists would be devastating. Our job is not to come to the Senate these days with the Defense authorization bill and parrot the line of those who are reckless on this entire subject, saying what we really need to do is to build more nuclear weapons, to build bunker busters, earth-penetrator weapons, to talk about using them, to talk about testing nuclear weapons. That is not our job. It is not our responsibility. Our responsibility is to move in exactly the opposite direction. It is our responsibility to lead the way to stop the spread of nuclear weapons, especially to stop the spread of nuclear weapons, No. 1; No. 2, to safeguard the stockpiles of nuclear weapons that already exist-- yes, with us, with Russia and elsewhere; and then No. 3, and very importantly, to begin the long march toward the reduction of nuclear weapons. It ought to be our responsibility as a world leader to say we are going to try to do everything we can to see that a nuclear weapon is never again used in conflict and that we begin to reduce the stockpiles of nuclear weapons in this world. For months now, as I have heard people in positions of responsibility talk about the potential of designing new lower yield nuclear weapons or earth-penetrator nuclear weapons so that we can use them, I have shook my head and thought, what on Earth are they thinking about? Our job is to provide world leadership to try to find a way to reduce the stockpile of nuclear weapons in this world, to safeguard the stockpile of weapons that already exist, make sure terrorists never get their hands on one, stop the spread of nuclear weapons to other countries and to terrorist organizations and begin the march toward the reduction of the stockpile of nuclear weapons. If we begin this process to talk about modernization and testing and building new nuclear weapons and building designer nuclear weapons, and finding nuclear weapons that will bust into caves, it will not leave this world a safer place. It will make this world a more dangerous place. It is, in my judgment, a reckless course. I hope with all my might that the amendment being offered today to stop this march toward the building of new nuclear weapons and the discussion about the plausibility of simply using nuclear weapons as another device in conflict, I hope with all my might we stop it dead in the Senate right now. We have a responsibility. That responsibility is world leadership. I mentioned the article in Time magazine. The potential of one 10- kiloton nuclear weapon missing from the Russian arsenal acquired by terrorists to be detonated in an American city was devastating news to an intelligence community that became apoplectic about it, and should have been. That was just one, and there are nearly 30,000 nuclear weapons. Our responsibility is to make sure not that we build more, to make sure we reduce the stockpile of nuclear weapons and reduce the danger of nuclear weapons. I yield the floor.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I join my colleague, Senator Wyden, in working on this amendment. Let me say first that, as many know, I did not support the funding for reconstruction projects in Iraq with American taxpayers' money. My feeling was, if we were going to use American taxpayers' money to build children's hospitals and restore marshland and swampland, or to purchase garbage trucks, or to have a roads or jobs program, it ought to be done in this country--not Iraq. I felt strongly that the ability to fund the reconstruction in Iraq could easily come from Iraq oil. It is true they are not pumping quite as much as they had anticipated by July 1 or June 1 of this year, but it is also true that the price is near double what they expected--359 million barrels a day, which is what they intend to get. They will have a substantial amount of excess income over that which they need for Iraq and could easily pay for the reconstruction of Iraq. It is estimated that $160 billion in a 10-year period is the export value of Iraqi oil generated for the country of Iraq. But, nonetheless, the administration and a majority in the Senate and the Congress decided that U.S. taxpayers should fund the reconstruction in Iraq. The only cut in the reconstruction proposal of some $20-plus billion--the only cut in expenditures of that proposal--was offered by Senator Wyden and myself. We cut $1.8 billion from it with an amendment on the floor of the Senate which included cutting $100 million for gasoline that was being transported. Incidentally, I held a hearing on that in the policy committee. We had the person who was in charge of delivering gasoline from the Department of Defense to projects such as this, and he said that the contract for the delivery of gasoline into Iraq was costing $1 more a gallon than would have been delivered into Iraq by the agency in the Department of Defense which normally does that. Having said all that--pointing out we were the only ones cutting funding for the reconstruction projects--the Congress still passed that reconstruction project of nearly $18 billion in U.S. taxpayer funds for the reconstruction in Iraq. My concern--and I think the concern expressed by my colleague from Oregon--is that money be spent effectively and wisely and not wasted. If it is going to be spent--and I did not think this was the way to do it--but if it is going to be done, let us make sure it is not wasted. The Pentagon announced that it wants to fund it and has already signed and implemented contracts to fund $121 million for outsourcing the oversight of these reconstruction contracts. There is plenty going on in Iraq that ought to give us pause with respect to contractors. This is not a reconstruction contract. But you know what we know now about the Halliburton corporation charging the Federal Government for 42,000 meals a day and serving 14,000 meals a day to our soldiers. Let me say that again: charging for 42,000 meals a day which they say they delivered to U.S. soldiers when in fact they were delivering 14,000 meals a day and missing 28,000 meals somewhere. There is plenty of reason to be concerned about contractors that are engaged in that kind of behavior. With respect to these series of contracts for $129 million, they have selected corporations, they have already signed the contracts. The taxpayers, much to our chagrin, are obligated to pay these contracts. They have signed the contracts with companies that have inherent conflicts, in my judgment. How do you oversee a contract of another company with whom you already have an established business relationship in another contract? I don't know how you do that. Yet these contracts were signed and sealed and delivered and the taxpayer is on the hook for $129 million. I happen to think ``oversight'' is a responsibility of the Government, of the Federal agency that is going to spend the money. It is their responsibility to provide oversight, not someone else's responsibility. The saying is, ``The buck stops here.'' Where does it stop? It stops, it seems to me, with the Federal agency that is given the funding by this Congress. It is their requirement to provide oversight to make sure that funding is used in a manner that is appropriate. In this case, the Defense Department has said, no, we are not going to do that. We are going to contract out oversight responsibilities. Now I understand they are saying, well, it is not oversight. Really? That is what the provisional authority calls it. In writing, these are oversight contracts for $129 million. There ought not be oversight that is contracted out. It is a responsibility of the Federal agency. This chart shows some of the relationships of the companies, companies that are overseeing other companies. I don't intend to say with this chart these are bad companies. I intend to say a company that has a relationship with another company, a business, a contractual relationship, a financial relationship that is now told to oversee the work of this company, even though you have other interests and other financial arrangements with this company, I am saying there is an inherent conflict there. That is not the way to do oversight. Even if these potential conflicts did not exist, I would not support these contracts. Oversight is not the responsibility of a hired gun someplace. It is the responsibility of the Federal agency. Senator Wyden and I have offered a relatively simple amendment. We would have offered an amendment that strikes or nullifies those contracts, but we have been told to do so still leaves the Federal Government on the hook. That does not make much sense. It seems to me what we ought to do is make sure this does not happen again. The amendment we are offering says oversight is a government responsibility, first and foremost. We establish that principle. Second, we say these oversight contracts shall not be renewed. And third, it says the Pentagon cannot award such contracts in the future. We have provided a couple of exceptions where we think it is impossible for them to do anything other than have some narrow contracts where it is required, but generally speaking, the approach the Pentagon has used would be prevented prospectively by the amendment we now offer. Again, our original proposal would have terminated all these contracts outright. I prefer that be the case. These contracts, as I understand it, would still obligate the American taxpayers, and are enforceable. I think that is an approach we cannot get through.

Mr. DORGAN. I am happy to yield.

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, it was my intention to speak in favor of the amendment prior to that.

Mr. DORGAN. At which point I would be recognized?

Mr. DORGAN. I am agreeable to that.

Mr. DORGAN. I say to my colleague from Oregon, that is correct. Our approach is simple. We think there are so many billions of dollars ricocheting around on reconstruction with respect to Iraq that there is a profound opportunity for waste. I don't think anyone in this Chamber wants money wasted. We all want good oversight. We want good stewardship of the taxpayers' funds. We do not believe that is the case when inherent conflicts of interest result. That is the purpose of our offering this amendment. Let me again say the Senator from Oregon, Senator Wyden, not just on this issue but on the other issues relating to the $1.8 billion in spending cuts we got done with our joint amendment, does extraordinary work in this area. I appreciate the opportunity to work with him. I yield the floor.

Mr. DORGAN. I ask the amendment be accepted.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, my understanding is, by unanimous consent, Senator Brownback will follow Senator Kyl. I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to follow Senator Brownback.

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I would like to extend my deepest sympathy to the Reagan family, and to send a thank you from a grateful Nation to someone who served this country so well. And I know that the citizens I represent in North Dakota feel the same way. President Reagan had a profound impact on the demise of the Soviet Union and the end of the cold war. I recall in the 1980s, in the middle of the cold war, when the lives of two men intersected: Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev. These two men were very different in many ways, but they changed the course of history. Together, President Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev sat down together to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons, to reduce the stockpile of nuclear weapons in both countries. The Soviet Union no longer exists. Eastern Europe and the Warsaw Pact no longer exist. The Communist threat and cold war that stemmed from them is gone. And much of the credit, in my judgment, belongs to President Ronald Reagan. We all recall the historic occasion when he stood at the wall in Berlin and said, ``Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.'' It was a moment I will never forget. But President Reagan was defined by more than this moment. When hundreds of American troops were killed in Lebanon, it was Ronald Reagan who went to the press room and said: I am accountable. You don't see many in politics do that, but he did. In 1986, I served on the House Ways and Means Committee, in which we provided the most significant tax reform that had been done in many decades in this country--under the leadership of a President who said let's reduce tax rates for all Americans and get rid of some of the tax loopholes. This President led and the Congress followed. I was proud to be a part of that. His Presidency was not without substantial controversy and difficulty. I felt his fiscal policy would produce very large budget deficits, and it did. And the Iran-Contra scandal was a serious problem for the administration. Yet, despite those problems and setbacks and controversies, I think President Reagan provided leadership in some very important areas. The charm of President Reagan was considerable. He had that cowboy hat kind of cocked back on his head. He had movie-star good looks. He had that famous smile. He was a great storyteller with a gleam in his eye. He told the story often about the pile of manure and the child who insisted that if there is a pile of manure, there must be a pony somewhere. The President loved to regale people with stories. I don't pretend to have known him well, but I sat behind him on the west front of the Capitol in 1981, when he gave his inaugural address. I recall that he announced to the country that planes had just left the tarmac in Iran with the American hostages, now freed. It was a gray, cold day and the first inaugural of President Reagan. As he began to speak, the clouds began to part and rays of sunshine began to come through. It was a remarkable moment. And I was a freshman member of the House when, one day, I was called to the bank of telephones in the Democratic cloakroom. They told me it was President Reagan calling. The President wanted my vote for a policy he was proposing to the Congress. I listened to him, but in the end, I felt he was not right on that particular issue, and I said I could not support him on it. He said: Well, you are a good man, and thanks for taking my call. It was just like him to frame it that way. I had the opportunity to have breakfast with him, along with a handful of my colleagues, one morning in the White House. Once again, he regaled all of us with wonderful, charming stories. I have always said that if you could have dinner with anyone, you could not do better than Ronald Reagan or Tip O'Neill, both Irish, both wonderful people with a wit and a charm, and both great storytellers. I believe that for President Reagan, politics was not bitter or rancid. In fact, he used to talk about the ``11th commandment'' for his party: Thou shalt not speak ill of someone in his own political party. It is a commandment that has been long forgotten, regrettably. I am afraid that today's politics have taken a turn for the worse. President Reagan was aggressive in debate but always respectful. I believe he personified the notion that you can disagree without being disagreeable. He was a man of great strength. After he was shot during an assassination attempt--seriously wounded--he was wheeled into the hospital emergency room, and he was ready with a quip for the doctors. He was a remarkable person. When the Challenger accident occurred and this country was horrified by seeing the explosion of the Challenger and the death of those astronauts, it was Ronald Reagan who came on television and talked about that ill-fated flight. But he did it in such an inspiring way, and finished with the refrain from that poem: They have slipped the surly bonds of Earth and touched the face of God. Later in life, as President Reagan lived in retirement in California, he began a long journey into the darkness of a devastating illness called Alzheimer's. His last statement to the American people was a poignant statement, in which he described his illness and its consequences. This is a man who served his country with great distinction, someone with whom I had disagreements from time to time, but someone who I believe is owed the admiration of an entire nation. I am reminded of a book that David McCullough wrote about another President, John Adams. In the book, you learn that John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail, as our Founding Fathers tried to put this country of ours together--and he asked these questions: From where will the leadership come? Who will be the leaders? How will the leadership emerge to create this new country of ours? And then he would plaintively say to his wife: There is only us. There is me. There is Ben Franklin. There is George Washington. There is Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. There is George Mason. Of course, in the rearview mirror of history, we recognize that these men were some of the greatest human talent ever assembled on Earth. But every generation has asked that same question for this great democracy. From where will the leadership come? Who will be the leaders? And this country has been fortunate that, in generation after generation, men and women of virtually all political persuasions have stepped forward to say: Let me serve this great country. Ronald Reagan was one of those leaders. He served in California as Governor and then served two terms as President of the United States. He had, in my judgment, a kind of a peculiar quality, a quality that gave him an almost quenchless hope, boundless optimism, an indestructible belief that something good was going to happen, and he communicated that to a grateful nation. So today we say thank you. Thank you for your service. God bless your memory, and God bless your family. I yield the floor.

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Then I will come back on Monday and offer the amendment I described and hope it may be seen by the Senate as something that represents an enhancement to this underlying Defense authorization bill. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, first, let me compliment the Senator from Massachusetts. I fully intend to support this amendment. I have spoken about this issue on the Senate floor previously. It is in my judgment that job one for this country is to attempt to stop the spread of nuclear weapons around the rest of the world, to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons, to make certain the nuclear weapons that do exist are protected and safeguarded, and then for this country to lead in this world to try to reduce the stockpile of nuclear weapons. But for this country to be talking about building new nuclear weapons, earth-penetrating, bunker-buster nuclear weapons or low-yield nuclear weapons, and have people in this administration talk about nuclear weapons as if they are just another weapon to be used in a war--drop a nuke on a cave someplace; just another weapon, that is what they are talking about--that this country should be wanting to build more, it is absurd. There are roughly 30,000 nuclear weapons on this Earth. The stealing of one of those weapons or the acquisition of one by terrorist groups would cause an apoplectic seizure for people who live in the major cities of this country that would be targeted by the detonation of a nuclear weapon. Our job is not to be talking about building new nuclear weapons. There are plenty of nuclear weapons on this Earth--far too many, in fact. Our job is to be a world leader in stopping the spread of nuclear weapons and to find ways to reduce the stockpile of existing nuclear weapons. That is the way we create a safer world, not talking about building more, not talking about resuming testing, not talking about bunker buster, earth penetrators, low-yield, usable nuclear weapons. That is, in my judgment, reckless talk. I intend to support this amendment. Mr. President, I am going to be offering an amendment to this Defense authorization bill dealing with the White House plan to use a military aircraft to broadcast Television Marti to the Cuban people. I want to talk about that just for a moment. It is almost unbelievable. When someone listens to the logic of all of this, they would say: Are you nuts? Is no one thinking at all about this? Cuba, as we know, is a Communist government, run by Fidel Castro. He, I think, has lived now through 10 American Presidencies, with an embargo on the country of Cuba through 40-some years. So we want to convince the Cubans that Fidel Castro is a bad deal for them. Well, I have been to Cuba. I do not think they need much convincing. They understand. They do not live in a free country. They understand that they live under the yoke of a Communist government. They would love to come to this country. If we had no immigration laws and Castro let them go, we would have an exodus to this country. So they do not need a great deal of convincing. But, nonetheless, we spend a lot of money on Television and Radio Marti. So Radio Marti actually gets into Cuba, and people listen to it. I have been to Cuba. The dissidents and others in Cuba indicated that Radio Marti is effective, although they can also pick up the radio stations from Miami easily. All those commercial stations are available to be listened to by the folks in Cuba. I support Radio Marti. It is fine with me. It gets into the Cuban broadcast range, the Cuban people listen to it, and I have been told by the Cubans in Cuba that it is effective. But TV Marti, broadcasting television signals into Cuba, let me talk about that for a moment. All those television signals are blocked so the Cuban people can't see it. We broadcast it. I want to show you what we have been doing with the taxpayers' money. This is a picture of something called Fat Albert. It is a tethered dirigible or balloon that goes up, and using Fat Albert we send television signals at Cuba. Traditionally, we have done it from 3 until 7 in the morning. We broadcast 4 hours a day through Fat Albert. The Cuban Government blocks the signal. So we spend the money for nothing. We have a balloon-enhanced signal to Cuba and nobody can see the image. In fact, here is how the television screen in Cuba looks. As you see, it is a scrambled screen. There is no TV picture. The President announced recently that he is going to get much more aggressive on TV Marti. One would think if what we are doing is a colossal, tragic, complete, thorough waste of taxpayers' funds, you would stop it. No, not us, not now, not with Cuba. We want to spend more money. The President says it doesn't matter that they can't see it. It doesn't matter that it doesn't work. What we want to do is phase out these balloons because they are old. What we want to do is take an EC-130 special operations aircraft, under the control of the Department of Defense, and use it to transmit TV Marti broadcasts to Cuba. The broadcasts may well still be jammed, and the Cuban people still won't be able to see them. But the President and the White House are talking about $18 million to be able to send these television messages into Cuba that the Cubans can't see. We have spent $180 million on TV Marti since 1989, $180 million on broadcast signals the Cubans haven't seen. One wonders if there is any depth to which foolishness will move in this Chamber, if we continue to do this. Is there anything that is beyond the pale? We just want to keep doing this? In fact, we want to get rid of the balloon, and we can put this aircraft up, run by a military special operations unit. There are only six of these aircraft in the world. They are extraordinarily valuable in the Middle East. We have used these airplanes to great value in the Middle East. They broadcast important messages to support U.S. military operations in places like Afghanistan and Iraq. But they will not be used to great value in Cuba. So if something doesn't work, the President and the White House announce we want to do more of it, and do it with more sophisticated equipment. We want to divert this aircraft from missions in war theaters-- Afghanistan, Iraq--and see if it can replace Fat Albert; put it up in the air and push television signals out the carcass of this airplane that the Cuban people probably cannot see or receive. It is unbelievable to me that the White House is pushing this nonsense. I am going to offer an amendment that will say we will prohibit the use of EC-130 special operations aircraft and other aircraft for transmission of TV Marti broadcasts to Cuba or radio broadcasts to Cuba. We already get the radio broadcasts in. We don't need to do it with special operations aircraft. Having a special operations aircraft available probably will not get TV signals in effectively. My point is, why waste the money? We were told yesterday that we are short of money for DOD. We were told we should have a $25 billion reserve fund. This Congress voted for it without a dissenting vote. Why? Because we are short of money. We need it, so the Congress provided it. Do we want to use scarce resources for flying a special ops airplane, of which there are only six in the entire world, so that we can send signals that will be jammed by Fidel Castro? I don't have any use for Fidel Castro. I want the Cuban people to be free. But I want the American people to be free from this nonsense. These are taxpayers' moneys that come from the pocketbooks of the American people, and they ought not be wasted. This is a tragic waste of the taxpayers' money. While I am at it, let me make one more point. We have folks who are in the Treasury Department in an organization called OFAC, Office of Foreign Assets Control. Their job is to track terrorist funds, the funds that support terrorists groups. Down at the Office of Foreign Assets Control, they have 21 people tracking American tourists who travel to Cuba. And they have fewer than four who are tracking assets that are supporting Osama bin Laden. That is unbelievable to me. Recently I brought a picture of a woman named Joanie Scott to the Senate floor, a wonderful young woman who came to see me. She went to Cuba to distribute free Bibles. But she found out those fearless warriors in OFAC were not tracking Osama bin Laden. They were tracking Joanie Scott who was distributing free Bibles to the people of Cuba and slapping her with a $10,000 civil fine. And it is not just Joanie Scott. It is a whole series of others, such as a man whose father died, and his last wish was that his ashes be buried at the church in which he ministered in Cuba. His son takes them there, and OFAC, instead of tracking Osama bin Laden's funding, is going after this guy with a civil fine for taking his dead father's ashes to bury them in Cuba. That is the kind of nonsense that is going on. It has nothing to do with sound public policy. It has everything to do with politics in Florida. This administration is playing it like a violin. The fact is, this ought to stop. I will support the Defense authorization bill, but I hope my colleagues will agree with me that diverting money from the Defense Department to put up a special operations EC-130 to broadcast television signals to the Cuban people who probably won't be able to see it is a waste of taxpayers' money, and it ought to stop. Regulatory Agencies

Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I read in the paper a story that reminded me that we have some real problems with respect to regulatory agencies these days. I happen to think there is a significant role for effective regulation in government, especially in areas where you have monopolies or the potential of abuse of consumers and citizens. That is why you have regulatory authorities, and there is a requirement for them to regulate effectively. I noticed in the paper that ``SEC Seeks Psychologist to Boost Morale.'' It says: Some former SEC officials find the idea of an SEC psychologist laughable. This is a full-time position that will pay $147,000 a year, and they want to improve employee attitudes and job satisfaction, reduce burnout, conflict, and stress by hiring a psychologist. I don't doubt there is plenty of need for psychologists in Washington, DC. This came on the heels of a report in the newspaper about the Bureau of Indian Affairs sending a number of employees to Tony Robbins' motivational course in Chicago, IL, at a cost of tens of thousands of dollars. At a time when we don't have enough money to fund health care needs for Indian children, to fund Indian tribal colleges, to deal with the social service needs of most of these children on Indian reservations, we are sending people off to the Tony Robbins motivational course in Chicago, spending a small fortune. As I was thinking about these things, which seemed to me to be a waste of the taxpayers' money, I was thinking about the issue of regulation. Last evening, I saw the CBS report about what had happened in California with electricity prices. I held hearings and I chaired the subcommittee in Commerce holding hearings on the issue of the fleecing of west coast consumers who were paying prices for electricity that were outrageous a couple of years ago. We subpoenaed Kenneth Lay, former head of Enron. He came in and took the fifth amendment in front of our committee. We had Jeffrey Skilling. He actually testified. He is now under indictment. I was thinking about this issue of regulation, when I read last evening the transcript of Enron employees talking about going ahead and shutting down the electric plant. That way, you have less supply of electricity out there. You inflate the price and we can maximize profits, manipulate the supply in order to maximize profits. They say: Well, all the money you guys stole from those poor grandmothers. The other guy says: Yes, Grandma Millie, that's Grandma Millie. They laughed about stealing money from people by manipulating and shutting down electric plants. This all happened while we had the FERC, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission--people who are paid by the taxpayers who are supposed to regulate--sat on their hands; they did their imitation of a potted plant and did absolutely nothing. One might ask consumers on the west coast about the $5 billion to $10 billion that was stolen from them by manipulating supply and demand and the inflating of prices by cartels, by traders who created schemes named ``get shorty,'' ``fat boy,'' ``death star,'' and ``load shift.'' These are organizations--and there is more than one--that, in my judgment, stole billions of dollars. Yes, there are some indictments, but some are still living in their gated communities and counting that money. The Federal regulatory agency here, called FERC, did the American public an enormous disservice by deciding their job wasn't to regulate, it was to observe. If a regulatory agency is not going to regulate in cases where you have the stealing of billions of dollars, then we don't need that agency at all. We ought to dissolve it and create one that will work. Here is another regulatory agency, the Federal Communications Commission. They are not regulating, either. They are content to just observe. They just came up with new rules on broadcast ownership. They said, oh, by the way, it will be all right with us if, in one major city in this country, the same company owns eight radio stations, three television stations, the cable company, and the major newspaper. That will be fine. That is what the FCC said. You talk about abridging the rights of people in this country. This is a decision that means a handful of people--fewer and fewer people-- will decide what the American people see, hear, and read in the future. Hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people wrote to the FCC complaining about the proposed rule. It didn't matter a bit. They went ahead and adopted it anyway. This is not a regulatory agency. At least they are not representing the interests of the American people. It is what the big interests want; let us move in that direction. It is what the big and powerful interests want--that is what we will do. That is true with FERC, with the FCC, the Surface Transportation Board, STB, and the SEC. The Surface Transportation Board took the place of the Interstate Commerce Commission, the ICC, which I always thought was dead from the neck up. We replaced it with something called the STB. It doesn't matter. They are supposed to look after the railroads and make sure consumers are not cheated. In North Dakota, we are overpaying rail rates by $100 million. Does the STB care about that? They don't give a whip. They are supposed to regulate and they are content to sit on their hands and observe. I met with them yesterday; same old story. The Securities and Exchange Commission wants to hire a psychologist because of employee stress. It is interesting to me that the investment banking firms were investigated in this country and reached a settlement because they internally, some of them, were trying to sell stocks to the public that internally they called dogs. They said, we have these stocks that are real dogs, not worth anything, but let's market them to the public. They had sales people trying to sell the stocks that they described as dogs. Do you know who uncovered all that double dealing going on, the basic conflicts of interest? Was it the SEC, the ones that have hundreds of lawyers who are supposed to be doing this? No, the Securities and Exchange Commission, which wants to hire a psychologist because they have such stress on their jobs, didn't do a thing. It was the attorney general of New York State. How about the scandal with the mutual funds? Was that the SEC, the organization that is so stressed out they want to hire a psychologist for employees? Unfortunately not. They were busy observing. The first Chairman under this administration said it would be a kinder and gentler SEC, we are probusiness. That is the message he wanted to send. Well, that is certainly true. They have done nothing. It was Elliot Spitzer, the attorney general of New York, who unearthed both of those scandals. So much for the SEC, and so much for job stress for people who don't do anything. The FDA is supposed to regulate as well. They seem content to represent the pharmaceutical industry. They have spent their time in recent months trying to prevent the Congress from providing for the reimportation of FDA-approved drugs from Canada. Why? Beats me. When the question is asked, whose side are you on, they come down on the side of the pharmaceutical industry, not the consumer. We are trying to put downward pressure on prescription drug prices. They are in the wrong corner. I don't need to mention much about the FTC. When gas prices are $2.10 or $2.20 a gallon, you would hope to have an agency like the FTC that would be aggressive and active, and that you would see a cloud of dust from an investigating agency trying to find out what is happening. We know some of what is happening. There is a lot of trading and speculation going on, and a great deal of concern that consumers are being taken advantage of. Do we see much activity out of the Federal Trade Commission? Not much going on there, either. It is a great place to nap, apparently. There is a good reason, it seems to me, for us to start asking: Is there not a requirement for a regulatory authority that regulates? I know this notion of deregulation is wonderful. But if you deregulate in the face of monopolies, the American people, in my judgment, are going to be injured severely. Ask people in California, Oregon, and Washington, who paid sky-high rates for electricity, about the need for effective regulation. Why did they pay those rates? Because a company such as Enron, and others, I might add, got involved and found ways to cheat. They created schemes, such as ``get shorty,'' ``fat boy,'' ``death star,'' and others, by which they could cheat the ratepayers, the consumers. I think there is a time when you need effective regulation. Going back to one more point, I mentioned all of these agencies--the SEC, FDA, Federal Communications Commission, Surface Transportation Board, and others. They are all there for a purpose. If they are not serving that purpose, maybe we don't need them at all. It is a purpose, however, that I embrace. I believe the American people deserve someone who fights for them. When the railroad overcharges somebody, in my judgment, they ought to be able to file a complaint and find due process in a regulatory body that is not on the railroad's side, or that automatically decides for the railroads, but in a way that fairly and effectively deals with those complaints. When the FCC is looking at what the impact is of the concentration of broadcast properties, I hope they will not come up with the conclusion that it is not a problem for the consumers if one company owns eight radio stations, three television stations, the newspaper, and the cable company in the same town. I do not know what school you go to learn that sort of nonsense, but that is not the right thing for this country. Incidentally, on that subject, the Senate agrees with the position I have articulated. We voted on this issue and by a wide margin the Senate voted to overturn the Federal Communications Commission's rules on broadcast ownership, but it is not going anyplace because the leaders in the House of Representatives are blocking that resolution. My hope is as we proceed through this year and work on appropriations issues we might be able to address some of these issues with regulatory agencies. If we are going to have regulatory agencies--and I think we should in a good many areas; I do not think they need psychologists, they need leadership--they need an administration that says: Your job at the FCC, FDA, FERC, and others is to effectively represent the interests of the American people, and when you have big interests confronting small interests, you need to be the fair referee here, the one that evens the score a bit. I mentioned many times the refrain in Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys song from the 1930s, but it applies pretty well: Little bee sucks the blossom and the big bee gets the honey. The little guy picks the cotton and the big guy gets the money. With respect to Government, there ought to be a mechanism that provides protection for the smaller interests when confronted by the larger interests that want to take advantage of it. What happened on the west coast should never have happened with respect to electric grids because the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission should have stepped in immediately, but they would not; they did not. The President, in fact, when he took office bragged: There will be no price caps; we won't put any caps on prices because we want the market to work. The market was not working. There was massive stealing and cheating going on of west coast consumers by some folks who got rich in the Enron Corporation, and others. That is not speculation on my part. We now know this as a function of criminal filings that have been made in these cases. We now know it as a result of tape recordings that were made available only under duress by the U.S. Justice Department in the last couple of days. ``Enron Traders Caught on Tape,'' ``Enron Tapes Anger Lawmakers.'' The American people deserve better. The American people deserve much better than they are getting with these regulatory agencies that decide they do not want to regulate. I wanted to visit about these regulatory agencies. Some will not like what I have to say. Frankly, I do not like their inattention to the issues facing the American people in a manner that is not fair to many people. I come back to where I started, the amendment I discussed earlier about prohibiting the use of special operations aircraft to broadcast TV Marti signals into Cuba. My amendment is a prohibition on the use of money for that purpose. Radio Marti is effective. I have been to Cuba. They hear those signals. It is effective. We have spent nearly $180 million on TV Marti. It has been a tragic waste of the taxpayers' money. Those signals are not able to be seen in Cuba. They are blocked. To appropriate military aircraft for the use of sending signals that will likely still be blocked and not seen by the Cuban people seems folly to me. I ask unanimous consent that we lay the current amendment aside so I may formally offer the amendment I have described.

Mr. DORGAN. Let me ask the Senator from Nevada the status of the legislation in the Senate. It is my intention to offer the amendment. Of course, I will have the opportunity. Is it the intention of the floor managers not to allow amendments the rest of the day?

Mr. DORGAN. Let me also say--I know the managers of the bill are not here--as an observation, it would make a lot of sense to move amendments. There is always the case of people coming to the floor of the Senate saying: Boy, we don't want any delays; this is taking too long. And yet on a fair number of occasions, when I have come to the floor, there is someone--in this case it is not the Senator from Nevada himself. Well, I guess it is the Senator from Nevada at this point saying someone objects. I would prefer we offer amendments, get them to the desk, and consider them with votes in due course. If there is a decision or an objection at this point to setting aside the current amendment, which is the course that must be taken, then I will come back, I guess, on-- on Monday or Tuesday, will we be open for amendments?

Mr. DORGAN

Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, let me request 10 minutes in morning business. If I see the Senator from Virginia desiring the floor, I certainly will not continue.